FLORINO. - A Gnostic contemporary of Policarpo, a companion in youth of s. Ireneo (v. IRNERIO, in Eusebio, Hist. eccl., V, 20, 5), at first an official at the imperial court, later, according to Agapio (PO 7, 516), a presbyter in Rome.
Against him s. Ireneo wrote a letter De monarchia seu de mala and another letter De Ogdande, when F. had embraced Valentinianism. His doctrines, as they were set forth by Agapio (ibid.) with far too little precision, cannot be assigned to any of the known Gnostic systems.
BIBL.: K. Kastner, Irendus von Lyon und der römische Presbyter Florinus, in Der Katholik, 42 (1910, 11), pp. 40-54, 88-105; H. Koch, Textilität und der röm. Presbyter Florinus, in Zeitschrift für neutrament. Wissenschaft, 13 (1912), pp. 59-83; K. Kastner, Zur Kontroverse über den engellichen Ketzer Florinus, ibid., pp. 133-46; A. Baumstark, ibid., pp. 306-10. The source of Agapio was, according to C. Becker, in Der Islam, 3 (1912), p. 299 sg., Treffio di Edessa; see also F. Haas, Altebristische Kirchengeschichte nach orientalischen Quellen, Lipsia 1925, p. 354 sc. Erik Peterson